At times in Christian thought, the priorities of pure doctrine and passionate mission have been perceived as opposites on a spectrum where emphasis on one results in neglect of the other, but without one, the other is deficient and doomed to crumble. Mission without doctrine is like a body without a skeleton, but apart from mission, doctrine is like dry bones in a museum. A Lutheran Reformission maintains a dual emphasis, resulting in doctrinal missions as well as missional doctrine.

Monday, March 30, 2015

For this week's newspapers, I answered a question about whether it is appropriate for Christians to set aside certain days to commemorate people or events of a religious or civic nature:

Q: I’ve heard accusations recently
that it is unbiblical for Christians to celebrate certain days or seasons as an
observance of people or events from church or national history. When, if ever, is it acceptable for
Christians to do this?

We can find evidence that humans have
set aside certain days of the year as commemorations throughout history, even
when their only tool to do so was the angles of the sunlight shining down on
the earth. In Bible history, we see the
same pattern, as the Lord forbids Israel from joining in the religious festivals
of their unbelieving neighbors, but also gives them a calendar for their own
commemoration of His deeds in history.

They remembered God’s act of creation
on the New Year, the forgiveness of sins on the Day of Atonement, and the
giving of the Law on Pentecost. The
Passover was not only instituted to save the people of Israel from the tenth
plague upon Egypt, but also given as a yearly commemoration of God’s
deliverance from death and from Egyptian slavery. After the Israelites settled in the Promised
Land, they celebrated the Feast of Booths as a commemoration of their ancestors’
40 years of wandering the wilderness on their way from Egypt, and later, the
festivals of Purim and Hanukkah marked other events of God’s deliverance.

In similar fashion, the Christian
Church also holds a yearly cycle of festivals remembering the life of Jesus and
His provision for the Church. Nearly all
Christians celebrate Christmas and Resurrection as a minimum. The most historic churches spend the first
half of their liturgical year remembering the major events in our Lord’s
earthly life, and the remainder focusing on His teachings as they have been
handed down to the Church which preserves and proclaims them.

While the date and number of these
festivals is not given in the New Testament, we do know that the Church began
to read Scripture in a predictable pattern from very early on. Historical documents from outside of
Scripture also indicate that the Resurrection was celebrated at the same time
as Passover within the lifetime of the Apostles, that Lent became a time of
preparation for this festival by the end of the First Century A.D. and that Christmas
was a common festival by the first half of the Second Century, giving a strong
indication that this tradition of the Church in commemorating feasts and
festivals was approved by the Apostles themselves and is an ancient part of the
Church’s life.

We also see today that the Church
commemorates other events in the lives of Biblical saints such as the Annunciation,
when our Lord’s conception was proclaimed to Mary by the Angel Gabriel, and the
Confession of St. Peter, who boldly proclaimed Jesus as the promised
Savior. In addition, other Biblical
saints and their roles in the Scriptures are remembered on the dates of their
deaths, and other important figures in Christian history are commemorated for
their exemplary contributions to the life of the Church.

The types of feasts, festivals, and
commemorations listed above would all be an ancient and acceptable part of
Christian tradition, along with other events such as the anniversary of a
congregation, when Christians might gather to thank God for providing in a
particular way. The only caution
regarding these festivals would be to ensure that they are held in thanksgiving
for what God has done, rather than being transformed into worship of the human
persons involved in God’s works.

National and civic commemorations are
also appropriate for Christians to engage in outside of their congregations,
provided that they do not involve idolatrous worship or a compromise to their
confession of Christ to the world.
However, in most cases it is inadvisable to make these commemorations a
part of the church’s worship life, but rather to let the nation’s festivals be
celebrated by the nation and the Church’s be celebrated by the Church, and
allow the members to participate in both according to their vocation.

Monday, March 16, 2015

For this week's newspapers, I answered a question about to whom and for what we should pray:

Q: When Christians pray, who
should they pray to, and what things should they pray for?

The typical formula by which
Christians pray is a prayer to God the Father, through or for the sake of Jesus
– God the Son, and guided by God the Holy Spirit. This sort of prayer includes the whole
Trinity, and acknowledges that we have no right to approach God in prayer,
except because His Son Jesus had died in our place, forgiven our sins, and
reconciled us to His Father, and that it is only by the Holy Spirit that we can
trust in Him and rely on this.

The public prayers of several liturgical
traditions reflect this by ending with the words, “…through Jesus Christ, Your
Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now
and forever. Amen.”

Sometimes less-formal prayers simply
shorten by praying to God “in Jesus’ name,” and other prayers might pray to
Jesus Himself without mentioning the other members of the Trinity. Although permissible in theory, prayers
directed toward the Holy Spirit are only rarely seen in the history of
Christian prayer.

Because the Triune God forbids those
who trust in Him from mixing His worship with that of other gods, it would be
inappropriate for Christians to pray to any god other than the persons of the
Holy Trinity, such as the Muslim Allah, the many Hindu gods, or local ancestral
deities, or to direct prayers to demons or to lesser spirits associated with other
religions.

Prayers to creatures that are real
and good, but are not God Himself would also be prohibited. This would include prayers directed toward
angels, other Bible characters, and Christians who have died before us. This is made clear in Scripture when St. Paul
writes to Timothy that “there is one God and one mediator between God and men –
the man Jesus Christ.”

At some times and places, a
compromise has been suggested that, even though we may not pray to deceased
Christians, it is permissible to ask them to pray for us from Heaven instead,
much like we would ask a living neighbor to pray for us.

Even though this idea recognizes that
our deceased brothers and sisters still live with the Lord as members of the
Church, and some Scriptures even lean toward implying that they do pray for
us there, this has typically been discouraged in most times and places. This is the case because there is not a
direct Biblical instruction for us to ask them do so, because it has a
significant danger of crossing the line into worshipping the dead, either by
confusion or carelessness, and because we have the privilege of asking Jesus Himself intercede for us is, which is of infinitely higher importance.

In a related note, Jesus’ parable of
the Pharisee and the Tax collector also teaches us that the length and number
of prayers and those offering them is not an indication of God’s answer, so confining
our requests for prayer to the living congregation of believers does not impair
God’s ability to answer. Instead,
although persistence in prayer is a virtue, we recognize that the brief prayer
offered once is just as likely to be answered as the prayer of thousands
offered repeatedly.

This is because prayer is answered purely as a gift because of Jesus and not
because of our effort or worthiness. In
fact, in Jesus perfect prayer given to the Church, He instructs His followers
to pray for several things that God has already promised to do and which will
happen even without prayer. Yet we pray
for them out of confidence that they will happen, rather than in order to cause
them to happen.

Christians may pray for these things
that God has already promised with the certainty that He will grant them. They may also pray for any other good thing
in God’s creation—both earthly and spiritual—even if He has not promised that
He will certainly give it. In such
cases, we recognize that God may grant it, or He may know in His infinite wisdom
that we are better not to have it, and therefore withhold it for our
benefit.

The number of things for which Christians may not pray is a short list: They may not pray for those who already died
apart from Jesus to receive forgiveness and be saved, and they may not pray for
sinful things or things that are harmful to themselves or others. In such cases, we can be certain that God
will not grant what is asked for, because it is contrary to His revealed will.

Lutheranism is more than a cultural identity or a denominational label. In fact, this cultural and institutional baggage may be the primary obstacle in Lutheranism’s path.

To be a Lutheran is not dependent on a code of behavior or a set of common customs. Instead, to be a Lutheran is to receive Jesus in His Word, Body, and Blood for the forgiveness of sins in the Divine Service; and to be bearers of this pure Truth to a broken world corrupted with sin, death, and every lie of the devil and man’s own sinful heart.

While the false and misleading ideas of human religious invention are appealing to sin-blinded minds, they fail when exposed to the realities of life. It is tragic when souls are led to confusion and despair because of the false religious ideas with which they are surrounded. The Biblical doctrine taught by the Apostles and restored at the Reformation holds answers which are relevant regardless of time or place and offers assurance of forgiven sins and eternal life who all who believe its message.

I am a husband, a father, the pastor of St. John’s Lutheran Church (LCMS) in Burt, IA, and track chaplain at Algona Raceway.